December 16, 2005

Where Are My Corn Subsidies?

by

Douglas asks: "Is there a lot of experimentation, Gia's 'intellectual and creative rigor,' out there waiting to be discovered and presented?" Yes, there is. But often, obvious experimentation thrives when there's a "classic" against which to rebel. Modern dance against ballet; post-modern dance against Graham, etc. As Philadelphia's Headlong Dance Theater's members said years ago, they're not Steve Paxton. The ground had been broken and they see their experimentation as more subtle. I think this is true of a majority of the innovative dancemakers today. There cannot be peak periods of creativity every year.

I love and completely agree with how Anouk framed the advantages and disadvantages inherent in our different systems. The energy and passion here will never cease to amaze me.

One final note: Jerrold Nadler, Congressman from New York, once mentioned when he was testifying on behalf of the NEA (against the quota system), that New York City doesn't ask for corn subsidies.

Thanks to everyone for a great discussion, to Douglas for putting it together, and to Gia for provoking it. To be continued...

Posted by at December 16, 2005 1:25 PM

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What's going on here... For one week (Dec 12-16, 2005) we've asked a group of people with a keen interest in the dance world to come together online and debate. They'll be posting every day and we invite readers to join the conversation. Reader posts will be accessible by a link at the bottom of each blog entry, at the bottom of this side column, and we'll also excerpt reader comments in the main part of the blog. The intent of this discuassion, as in all AJ topic blogs ...
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Our topic Is it true, as Gia Kourlas declared in the New York Times in September, that "New York is no longer the capital of the contemporary dance world"? New York has, for so long, been at the center of dance, the idea is taken on faith in the US. Has the city lost its edge? And if not New York, where are the new capitals of dance? In Amsterdam or Bucharest? Berlin? Brussels, Paris or Vienna? Or has some of the energy that used to propel the New York scene spread elsewhere in America?